Research

Research Statement

I am interested in understanding the motor abilities and development characteristics of children with autism spectrum disorder and how the development motor skills relates to social skills, adaptive behaviors, and physical activity. Through this research, I am interested in the development of motor interventions, improving assessment, and building teaching strategies to better improve the development process of motor skills. Additionally, I am interested in the improvement of current and future physical educators’ ability to include and build motor skills with children with disabilities, especially autism spectrum disorder.

The words expressed in these posts are entirely of my own. In this section, I will discuss current thoughts, publications, and abstracts of current and past research studies with more detailed descriptions, including current standing and publication information.

Abstract:

This study, utilizing key concepts from Dynamical Systems Theory (DST), seeks to build a method for teaching gross motor skills to children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). As the rate of ASD increases, it is becoming evident, in addition to deficits in social/communicative behaviors, that there is a deficit in gross motor ability. As this area of research is a relatively new focus, little has been done to focus interventions on improving gross motor skill. To address this issue, this study proposes using DST to understand constraints (e.g. task, individual, and environmental) affecting movement and use constraints to teach gross motor skills to children with ASD. By presenting a set guideline for constraining variables involved with movement, the researcher proposes that children with ASD will be able to learn motor tasks more effectively. Using both quantitative and qualitative measures, this study seeks to understand a) What effects do constraints have on the development of fundamental gross motor patterns of children with ASD? b) If changes exist, do they last in the absence of constraints? c) What influences do changes in gross motor patterns have on adaptive behavior skills? and d) How do changes in gross motor skills affect other facets of a child’s life? By understanding how constraints affect motor patterns and how those changes ripple across a child’s life, children with ASD will be more effective in developing lasting changes in their motor learning.

research projects

The words expressed in these posts are entirely of my own. In this section, I will discuss current thought, publications, and abstracts of current and past research studies, with more detailed descriptions, including current standing and publication information. Content is updated regularly, please check back often.